Anwyn’s shoulders gave a little jerk, and his attention snapped to her. From her tighter grip on his jeans and the way her head bowed lower, Gideon realized that tears were slipping down her face. They made soft drips as they rained into the water.
“Anwyn, sweetheart. It’s okay. You’re going to be all right.” Manfully ignoring the fact that Daegan was so close Gideon was almost pressing against his leg like a faithful hound, Gideon dropped to one knee. Sliding his arm around her slim back, he let her grip shift, dig into his forearm, as she pressed her face to it, silently crying. “Just let it out.”
“Here,
cher
.” Daegan stepped into the large tub, and sank down behind her. In agreement on this at least, Gideon guided her back so that Daegan could draw her into his sheltering embrace, let her lie against his chest. He directed a nod to the corner of the tub and Gideon handed him the large cup with a handle there. While plastic, it looked like a frosted glass, with an etching of a graceful lily on it. Like everything in this bathroom, it was as lovely and precise as the woman who owned it.
Daegan used the cup to wet her hair anew, pouring it slowly over the brown locks and following it with the stroke of his fingers. There was still some blood, because the water did get a faint pink tinge around her. For now, her eyes were closed, but Gideon didn’t want her to notice that when they opened. He rose, dimming the lights. Noting a bevy of white candles on a silver tray on the counter, he found the lighter next to them and further shadowed the details of the room in flickering candlelight.
While he didn’t appreciate such ambience, he knew women did, using it to calm themselves. He’d recognized the candles’ scent as the one that lingered in the room from her last bath. Maybe it was ridiculous to think such simple things could mute the horror of the violence done to her, but sometimes reclaiming the normal helped, fooled a victim into thinking she could make it no more than an unpleasant memory, give it no more claim on the present than anything else.
Went to work, fed the cats, got beaten, raped and turned into a vampire, took a bath, watched
CSI
and went to bed. Jesus.
“Gideon.” Anwyn’s blue-green eyes were riveted on him. “Will you deny me?”
He clenched the lighter in a death grip. While he couldn’t respond to her, he couldn’t make himself move to undress either, which he guessed was the answer to her question. When she closed her eyes, turning her face back into Daegan’s shoulder, he felt as though she’d kicked him in the balls. Daegan gave him another of those inscrutable looks, as condemning as an angel’s.
Damn it, damn it, damn it.
He barely knew her. He didn’t have to do this. She didn’t have the right to ask it of him. As for Daegan, he could just fuck off, because Gideon didn’t owe him anything.
Deliberately, he put the lighter down, and stepped out of the bathroom. Once out of their sight, he stood for several moments, staring blankly at the wall. Then he shrugged out of his jacket and unstrapped the two wrist rigs, as well as the nine-millimeter in its shoulder holster. Removing the T-shirt Anwyn had loaned him, he stripped out of the daggers he wore on his upper body. He shucked off his jeans to get rid of his clutch piece and a couple more wooden blades he wore there. With a deep breath, he removed boxers and socks.
With or without his clothes, in or out of the tub, if the vampire wanted to attack him, he would have already had him. His boots were in the bathroom, and he could detach the toe blade fast if he needed it, but it was false comfort. Without the element of surprise, he’d have as much chance as an infant. Particularly against a vamp that fast and obviously trained for battle.
He had to believe that wasn’t part of the equation here. The one thing he knew for sure was Anwyn wanted them both in the tub. Needed them as close as she could get them. Her reaction to his refusal, as inexplicably painful to him as a lashing with a metal-tipped cat-o’nine, was what tipped the scales in her favor, despite every strenuous objection his mind was roaring. He’d endured being tortured with a cat-o’-nine; he couldn’t bear the disappointment and need in her blue-green eyes.
Anwyn’s soft voice cinched it. “Where did he go, Daegan? You didn’t make him leave, did you?”
“No, sweet
cher
. He’s divesting himself of his arsenal. He’ll be right back, fifty pounds lighter, I’m sure. He’s coming back to you.”
Gideon stepped back in. He’d intended to give Daegan a scowl, but the vampire was involved in washing her hair, massaging the lather slow and easy on her skull. Bubbles were spreading out over the water like foam across a tide line, further masking anything being washed off of her. Anwyn had her eyes closed again. Gideon thought tears were still running down her face, and then he was sure as he saw her chest hitching in silent sobs.
Damn it, he couldn’t do this. It was like red-hot shrapnel in his chest, seeing her distress and not being able to do anything but be here. God, he wanted to kill something. He really should go, start tracking, let Daegan do this . . .
Instead, he crossed the room, braced his hands on the tub wall. Doing his best to ignore the vampire, he leaned in and brushed his mouth over hers, an easy, tender caress, undemanding, a silent apology. Her eyes opened, seeking him, and he stayed there, letting her stare into his soul, see the things he didn’t understand himself.
He didn’t doubt that getting into the tub with her and a vampire was insane. But the instant relief in her face told him he was going to do it. Then her gaze coursed over him, settling on his cock. It had lost some of its waywardness, but at her attention, it began to rise again, heedless of her tears. God, he was a beast. Before he could apologize for it again, her lips had curved, a tear caught on that tremulous but brave upward turn. He had a sudden urge to place his lips there again, gently suck it off, tease her mouth to opening, let her lose herself in the sensuality that was so much a part of her, banish the horror with it, even though everything he’d ever known about rape victims told him she wouldn’t want that. But her response to that kiss suggested a different path, at least for her.
“Come be with us, Gideon,” she said.
9
I
T was a large Jacuzzi tub, but he and Daegan were large men. However, as if anticipating a need to make some room, Daegan had his knees bent, also forming a convenient cradle for Anwyn to lean against. Gideon lowered himself into the water, sucking in a breath. As the hot water closed over his balls, he sent an apology to the sperm being in cinerated.
Well, it wasn’t as though he was expecting to produce heirs. Last thing he’d ever do was bring a child into this kind of world.
“I can help with the washing,” he said gruffly. “If you want me to.”
“You know what soap is? I’m stunned.”
Gideon’s eyes narrowed, but Daegan’s remark brought a cautious flicker of amusement to Anwyn’s gaze that made the barb worth it. She gave him a slight nod of permission.
Daegan angled his chin toward a bottle of creamy soap in the corner. When Gideon picked it up, along with a clean washcloth, he found it had a fresh scent to it that matched the smell he’d experienced on Anwyn’s skin earlier. For all that they’d done in the Queen’s Chamber bathing area, somehow doing this was far more intimate and personal, something that worked its way below the physical and made him feel a little more exposed. But nothing could feel more exposed than she was, with her wounded throat and chest, the recollection of the bruises and blood. He was about to kick his own ass if he didn’t get past his own hang-ups.
It’s because she matters to you, you prick. Pretend like she’s any other victim you’ve pulled away from a vamp, and you’ll be fine
. There hadn’t been many of those. Only four scant times in his bloody career had he arrived in time to save a vampire’s victim. He’d soothed them, cleaned them up if they needed it, gotten them to hospitals, and it hadn’t rattled him like this.
He worked the soap in the cloth as Anwyn curled up on her side against Daegan, her arms folded over her breasts. Her head rested on the firm curve of his biceps as he rinsed her hair with the cup again, fingers stroking through the strands. When he was done, she watched Gideon approach with those intent mermaid eyes, enhanced by the silken trail of wet hair outlining her temple, cheek and throat. Even so, he touched her knee, warning her before he began to smooth the soap down her back.
He wasn’t sure what she would be comfortable with him doing, but guidance came from an unexpected source. “Wash it all off, Gideon,” Daegan said quietly. “Don’t leave any part of them on her soft skin.” He nodded to a basket. “If you put some of those soap petals in, then the water will have soap in it and you can take the washcloth below the waterline and rub her with it.”
“Sounds like you’ve done this before.”
“No. Not this.”
A particularly harsh sob caught her then. Daegan tightened his arm around her, his hand pressing against the side of her head. He propped his arm on his knee, shielding her face from them both.
Gideon understood that this was best, to let her cry herself out without their interference, as often as she needed to do it. She didn’t need their words right now. But he couldn’t help moving in closer, even if it meant he had to slide his feet over Daegan’s shins, though he took pains to clear them without touching. Those silent sobs were wrenching his heart out of his chest. Daegan put his head down on hers.
This was just Part One of the evening’s agenda. Somebody was going to live to regret Part Two, big-time. If Daegan thought he was leaving Gideon behind for that, he’d better think again.
For now, though, Gideon began to rub the washcloth over her skin in slow circles. A plaintive sound escaped her lips. He could tell she welcomed the cleaning, but perhaps the touch reminded her of other hands that had been on her tonight. He knew it reminded him. Even if they got the sire’s blood and all these wounds disappeared, she’d still have to deal with them on the inside. The worst scars never showed on the outside. Moving beneath the waterline after depositing the petals as Daegan suggested, he ran the cloth slowly down her side, across her stomach. Though the vampire had said to wash it all off, he avoided her breasts, or too high on her thighs, anything that might cause her to flinch.
Even so, she turned in Daegan’s arms. Putting her hand over Gideon’s wrist, she held his movement, her fingers trembling.
“I’m sorry, sweetheart. I’m trying not—”
She shook her head. Despite the fact her eyes were still glistening, dangerous fire bloomed behind them. “I want you both inside me. Please. Get rid of it. I can’t . . . The bathing is . . . It’s good, but what I want is for them to be gone.”
Her hands had clenched, and though savagery was heavy in her tone, this wasn’t the burgeoning vampire. It was the woman, though her lips had curled back from those new fangs. Female fangs were so much smaller than the males’, even elongated in bloodlust. Almost dainty in their deadliness.
“I don’t want to hurt you.” Though her legs were folded together now, Gideon remembered the raw, torn skin between them. The wounds on her chest and abdomen were fused now, and he assumed that something similar had happened down below, but still . . . Daegan was silent behind her, his gaze lowered to the crown of her head so Gideon couldn’t tell his reaction.
“I’m commanding you. Please.” Her eyes filled with those tears again. Her face held a rictus of controlled determination, a combination he couldn’t refuse. Her psyche was as stretched as a rubber band but fragile as a thread. One more refusal from him might snap it.
“Hurry,” she said thickly. She shifted her grip to his forearms, clawing, trying to pull him to her. “Now. I can’t bear the feel of them anymore. Please. Don’t take any time. Just come into me.”
Jesus, his cock was ready for it, wanting it, too. And he admitted it wasn’t entirely mindless.
He
wanted to sear those cock-sucking assholes away from her flesh, and God help him, he wanted to do it in the most primal way a male could do it, removing their touch from the flesh of the woman he considered his . . . or rather, under his protection. Maybe both. The feeling was shocking, made all the more so because when Daegan’s gaze lifted, locking with Gideon’s, he saw the same thing there, only Daegan’s sense of possession of this woman was far more clearly stamped, no matter her feelings on the matter.
No vampire has a claim on me
, she’d declared, only hours before
.
I’d think twice about that one, Mistress
, Gideon thought, seeing the vampire’s eyes flicker with fire. He should have felt out in the cold again, but she was calling on them both. Her urgency wove around them, drawing the three of them irrevocably together.
“I will take her from this side, vampire hunter,” Daegan said. “You take her from there.”
Lifting himself up to prop on the edge of the tub, Daegan reached for a bottle of cobalt blue glass, nestled in the same basket that held the soap petals. As he poured some of the lubricant in his hand, preparing to work it over his cock, it was already high and hard, reacting with the same primitive eagerness as Gideon’s.
Gideon wasn’t into staring at guys on even his horniest days, but for some reason his heartbeat increased, watching Daegan take himself in hand to make his thick organ slick for Anwyn’s rear entry, minimizing her discomfort.
However, before he could get started on that, she’d turned toward the vampire with a slippery sound of skin squeaking over the bottom of the tub, like a vehicle spinning its wheels when the gas pedal was slammed down. She closed her mouth over Daegan, took him deep.
Gideon knew he’d have to be dead not to be stirred and admiring of the way she went down on the vampire to the hilt. He was a substantial guy, so she had to take part of him down her throat. She didn’t gag a bit. When her hands pressed into Daegan’s thighs, the vamp closed his eyes, a muscle flexing in his jaw as he gripped her hair, holding her as she sucked hard on him. She scored him a couple times with her newborn fangs, if his stoic flinch meant anything.
Then her mouth slid back up, the soft lips pausing over the head, coaxing viscous fluid from the tip and swiping it away with her tongue. She would have gone down again, but Daegan caught her hair, held her off of him, gave her a warning look. With a defiant expression, she turned in the water, creating a rolling current that lapped across Gideon’s belly as she left Daegan to prepare himself. Her gaze fell on Gideon’s cock now, just as turgid. She leaned forward, braced on her knees as she slid her hands down his chest, her nails digging in to his flesh, drawing red lines. He drew in a breath as she snagged a nipple painfully, but then she bent forward and her mouth closed over him as well.
Gideon surged up into her mouth, an involuntary reaction that summoned a clear growl of approval from her throat. He held himself above the waterline for her, but she didn’t look up at him, sliding down his length as expertly as she had for Daegan, tasting and sucking, drawing his flavor into her mouth fully to get rid of the one she didn’t want. Her tongue had the flexibility of a snake, coiling and teasing, stroking and lashing so that his cock pulsed in crazed, confused need, warring with the horror and guilt still boiling in his mind.
As if that wasn’t enough stimulation, Daegan generously lubricating his cock, growing even harder and thicker, made Gideon imagine in detail how it would bury into that other tight entry point.
“Just this moment.” She came up for enough air to mutter the ambiguous comment, but then she was down on him again. Her knees adjusted, spreading, her heart-shaped buttocks positioned in the air, her need clear. He’d never seen a woman go into a subservient position and yet be so clearly in control.
Daegan set aside the lubricant, his hand still working himself. That glistening tumescent organ slid through his clenched long fingers like a living beast. Gideon’s cock pulsed, making Anwyn growl again. When she swallowed, he knew he’d leaked pre-come into her mouth.
Then Daegan slid back into the tub. Meeting Gideon’s gaze again, he maneuvered one foot under Gideon’s splayed knee, so that as he went down to a sitting position, he was threading one long leg beneath Gideon’s, then the other, so the two of them were forming a diamond eye, with her in the center. Setting his hands to her hips, then her waist, Daegan drew her off of Gideon’s cock with effortless strength, straightening her as she reached down to hold on to his thighs.
“Spread your legs,
cher
.” Daegan uttered the husky demand. Gideon could tell he’d found her snug anal opening from the way she caught her lip in her teeth, her body shuddering in preparation. “Put them around Gideon so that he may do as you desire.”
Her legs unfolded. As she looked into Gideon’s face, he had no idea which expression would bring her the most comfort, so he let his attention move over the uptilted breasts, seeing past the wounds, and then down to her waist where Daegan’s fingers pressed into her pale flesh. Then farther, to the delicate petals of her sex, now open for his gaze as her small feet slid over the hair-roughened terrain of his thighs. Putting his hands on her ankles, he helped guide her. Daegan slid them both closer so that her legs could curve around Gideon’s back, brace against the tub’s slick walls.
“Aaahh . . .” Her cry was desolation and desire at once as Daegan pushed her down on his lubricated cock, easing deep into her ass. Her face suffused with a reaction so torn between relief and pain, Gideon couldn’t bear it. He really didn’t think he could do this. But his cock leaped in her hand when Anwyn grasped it, her fingers sliding over the engorged head beneath the water, liquid and firm heat together. “Inside me,” she whispered. As her head fell back onto Daegan’s shoulder, the vampire slid his hands up her abdomen to cup her breasts, his fingers capturing the nipples.
Gideon had always been a breast man, and hers were superbly shaped, high and firm. With Daegan holding them up like that, Gideon felt the damning saliva gather in his mouth. “Come closer,” Daegan said. “Suckle her sweet nipples. Give her comfort, Gideon.”
His mind shut down and his body moved. He’d felt helpless with the four victims’ pain, but there were certain things he could do for them. Medical help, assurance that they were safe, even the occasional embrace as they shook through the shock portion of their experience, until a family member or medical person took over and he could melt into the shadows once again. He knew how to bring violent justice. But this . . . He’d never experienced a victim needing what Anwyn was
demanding
. He wondered if it was the vampire carnality that had led her to this craving, or if it was the nature of the woman herself. Or if that part of her was already so close to a vampire’s the answer was irrelevant.
Sliding closer meant his thighs slid over Daegan’s, but the vampire’s head was bent, his lips on her neck as she made quiet whimpers in the back of her throat. Gideon’s cock brushed her pubic bone, close to her clit. Anwyn jerked up, making the water slosh, her hands digging into Gideon’s shoulders again. Gideon positioned himself, but then Daegan’s knuckles brushed the center of his chest, snapping his gaze up.
“Make sure she’s ready,” Daegan said.
Of course. This was about need and purging, not a slow, sensual build of pleasure. She might not be able to produce enough of her natural lubrication, and he could have hurt her worse, the last thing he wanted to do.
Though Gideon flushed hot, he knew it wasn’t the time to nurse a hurt ego. He squelched the desire to snap at the vampire, tell him he knew how to give a woman pleasure. The harsh reality was he probably needed the reminder. For the past couple years, up until Anwyn’s decree that there would be no money between them, he’d paid for sex. It was easier that way, so he could ram into a woman’s heat and release, relying on the woman’s professionalism to handle her part of things.
It wasn’t about a give-and-take, a sharing or melding, like this. This was far more than physical. While she desperately needed the physical scourging, it was an emotional one, too, driving back her attackers’ brutality and indifference to her pain with the opposite. Two men who cared unconditionally about her needs, about what happened to her, at least in this moment.